


'Star To The Left'

by TakeHomeJulie



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: F/M, I mean, i am hardcore bethyl but..., kind of messy didn't edit or read through so i hope it's okay, maggie and daryl relationship warning for all those bethylers who might be reading this, maggie/daryl is something i just discovered and it's adorable, so i might've cried?, that's only for me to know
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-05
Updated: 2015-02-05
Packaged: 2018-03-05 13:48:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3122480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TakeHomeJulie/pseuds/TakeHomeJulie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I think she’s up there,” the brunette whispers. “Right there. That star to the left.”<br/>“Why?”<br/>Beth Greene is dead, that what he keeps telling himself atleast. Each day passes and he only feels the aches, the pain that follows her death. It takes him too long to realise he loves her, but even Maggie can see it, and they both miss her dearly. [A.K.A Beth is dead and Maggie and Daryl aren't taking it too well]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 'Beth's Star'

His rough hands scratch at the ground, dirt that builds beneath his fingernails becoming more and more unforgiving. He doesn’t remember how he came to be there, digging up the grave because he forbids himself to believe she’s gone and it hurts more than anything in his entire life.

There was a single handbook that was shared between parents- that which involved children bent over laps and belts scarring their skin- and even that hurt less than the knowledge he’d lost her forever.

It’s a certain twist of a knife in his gut, figuratively, not literally, that jerks him upright. It’s seeing the dried and crusted blood on his shirt that shoots him awake, his spine tingling like Beth Greene’s ghost itself ran a chilling hand down it.

He remembers the weight of her tiny frame in his hands that refused to shake with breaths no matter how desperately he wished it would. He’d hope maybe he’d feel her come alive in his arms but there wasn’t anything like that anymore; no miracles.

His own hand flies up to grasp the cool chain around his neck which currently rests against the dirtied skin between his collarbones, sometimes far too harsh against the flesh when the silver cools in the winter winds. When he took it off Beth, Rick told him- over and over- how she’d want him to have it.

The next run they went on, Rick found a chain for him to put the charm- a single cross- from her bracelet on. He’d worn it everywhere, ignoring the weary looks of Maggie, whose face was hollowed.

Some days, she reminds him too much of Beth, far too much that he holds a hand to his eyes to stop from seeing the brunette. Her laugh- the seldom times she does use it- is nothing like her sister’s but also too far like it that it pains him to hear it, like his own personal thunderstorm is storming down upon his heart. It’s an unbearable pain.

The next time she laughs, he does more than hold a hand to his eyes, he yells. Her eyes find his in terror and Carl looks shaken, holding his baby sister on his lap.

_“You didn’t do nothin’ to get her back!”_

He doesn’t mean what he says, he doesn’t, but it doesn’t stop the words from falling out and when they’re gone- when his well of words is empty- she stands and walks away, Glenn parading after her.

He pretends he doesn’t see the looks the group flash him for the rest of the day.

_“She died because of you!”_

There are five words that single-handedly bring Daryl to tears and the next day, when he refuses to let Carol cut his hair, Maggie yells then out.

The cool of the silver is frozen around his neck and when he reaches out to touch Judy, the baby recoils like she’s been struck.

It’s been weeks- maybe months- since the child was last touched by the woman who had grown to be its mother. She may not have been the one that birthed it, but she’s definitely the mother.

Judith misses her, maybe a little more than Daryl, but it is far too young to understand the true pain of the loss. Daryl, however, feels it with ever crack and ache of his body.

He looks at Rick like he’s searching for an explanation but the man’s face is like a blank sheet.

It’s when Sasha starts to talk about Bob- how she loved him- and how he would’ve been proud of all them, that Glenn speaks, and this time, he says how Beth is looking down upon them.

There’s something that can only be described as a momentary silence before Maggie’s head snaps up, eyes still staring daggers at the red-neck and that is when she speaks the five words, the one that almost bring Daryl to his knees.

His first instinct is to run and hide, bury his face in his hands and pretend it’s Beth because that’s the only way he knows how to deal with things anymore.

But... He doesn’t.

He stares at her, feeling the burn in his eyes when he realises he can’t stop the tears that begin to glass them over.

_“She died because of you!”_

He knows he deserves it, after yesterday’s outburst, but it doesn’t subdue the sting that follows the words. There’s a certain bite in them that leaves him tasting copper, realising far too late he’s been biting the inside of his cheek hard enough to draw blood.

Daryl picks at the skin that surrounds his thumbnail, heaving in a deep breath to try and choke down the blood that is pooling in his mouth. He bit hard- much too hard- and instead of swallowing it down, he spits it out in front of him, watching the way Carl recoils, eyes following the blood mixing in the dirt by the red-neck’s feet.

He misses her.

With a shake in his steps, he walks over to the grave where she is, unclasping the chain because God forbid he have to deal with the weight of her on his chest. He hangs it loosely on the cross that sticks out of the dirt, bringing his rough hand to his face, letting out a broken sob into it.

He misses her, maybe even more than Merle because this girl, he loved her. He learned to love his brother by default, because they were simply family.

His brother wasn’t a bad brother, just a bad person, and it took Daryl far too long to realise that. He assumed his love for Beth was the same, because they were family, but when he picks up a handful of dirt, half-expecting to see she isn’t really in the grave, his hands touch something.

He knows he’s dug too deep, the few days he’s spent out here, fishing out lumps of dirt after endless lump of dirt. He doesn’t know the reason behind it, just that he wants her to be alive, wants to dig up her body and perform CPR like maybe _\- just maybe_ \- it might bring her back.

Maggie has a smile much like Beth’s which he realises too late, sitting near her that following night, while Carl tells a hideous joke over the flames of the small fire they lit.

It shows the tiniest hint of teeth but is equally beautiful to the blonde’s. He sees a spitting image of the woman he loved in her older sister and it brings an ache to his chest that feels like he might be having a heart-attack and he can only imagine the look on his face at that moment.

None of them seem to notice until he chokes something out and only the brunette seems to catch it because the corner of her lips turn down and he can’t tell if she’s upset or confused but he doesn’t decide to stick around and find out.

_“You look like her.”_

He goes back to sleep down beside a pile of dirt where the woman he loves lies six-feet under, chest now unwilling to breathe in the wake of death and lips- _that he never ever got to kiss_ \- cut like marble stone.

He can’t get Dawn’s voice out of his head, nor the way Beth’s blood felt sticky against the skin of his face or how he carried her down five flights of steps just to deliver her dead body to her sister.

Daryl doesn’t know which part of his life he regrets more.

He should’ve told her, that, too, he realises too late.

There are too many things he hasn’t realised until he’s tasted the copper of his own blood, learnt to hold his tongue and smelt the rotting smell of decay that seems too revolting to his nose to possibly be Beth but it is.

Maggie comes down shortly after, not saying anything, just lying down beside him and her hand entwines in his, voice quiet- and shaking- when she finally speaks.

“What did you mean?” she finally asks. “I look like her. What did you mean?”

He doesn’t know how to respond at first then his voice sounds out, almost as if magic. “Beautiful. She was beautiful.”

“The other day,” the brunette chokes, squeezing her eyes shut despite the stars above them that dot the sky. “You s-said I didn’t do anything, Daryl. That I didn’t try to get her back-“

“I’m sorry.”

“You were right.”

Neither of them are crying yet but it’s only a matter of time before they do because they’re lying next to Beth’s grave and Daryl still has a handful of dirt in his hand and a few strings of blonde hair are visible because he’s dug too deep, and now she’s coming out of the place where she rests.

“I didn’t either,” he says but he knows it’s a lie. He did everything, all a man could do, to bring her back to him. But it was too late, something that is a sickly reoccurring theme in his life right now.

“You really love her,” the older sister says and now she’s crying, which he only just notices. “Because each day, you’re down here and even when Judy cries, you’re still down here. Whole days pass and you’re sitting here with a handful of ground and words swirling in your mind. You should’ve said them, you should’ve told her.”

“Too late,” is all he says.

They sit like that for a while, hip to hip, shoulder to shoulder, shallow breaths matching one-another’s.

Daryl still can’t figure out why Maggie came down to talk to him so he asks but he sounds so quiet like a child, scared.

“What did you come down here for?”

Her head snaps to look at him, nose almost pointing into his cheek, dried tears glistening like small crystals in the moonlight.

“To talk,” she replies simply.

_“I don’t think the good ones survive.”_

His voice still sticks in his head and he curses the moment he utters the words like it was his fault she’s dead, like eight syllables cursed the blonde into an eternity in the ground, and it’s then- the exact moment- that he knows, just knows.

“Ya came down here because we both love ‘er.”

“Yes,” she confirms, rehearsed too much for one simple word.

“I want to hold her hand again,” he says, tears blurring his vision as he speaks, voice matching the shake in his body. “Or ‘ear her sing.”

“I want my sister back.”

Maggie goes quiet and he does too, both just lying there with the sky overheard, sniffling quietly and crying because God, do they miss her.

“I think she’s up there,” the brunette whispers. “Right there. That star to the left.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to think she’s watching us right now, knowing how m-much we miss her.”

He releases the dirt in his hand, instead moving to prop his head up on his arm, following Maggie’s thin finger as she tries to explain why Beth is the star _‘to the left’_.

Closing his eyes, he imagines the warm hand that’s holding his is Beth’s but his mind isn’t stupid enough to know that and he settles on Maggie, knowing it is indeed hers. It’s warm and clammy but neither makes a move to go away so they stay like that for a bit, crying and talking and sharing stories and staring at the sky, at Beth’s Star.

The star _‘to the left’_.


	2. 'The Twins'

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 'There is a grief settled down upon them like a cloak that can’t be removed, can’t be shaken or taken off, it is something that has to be worn.'  
> [A.K.A. Beth is still so, so gone and Daryl seeks comfort in the only way he knows how, by finding shelter in the shell of someone who is as broken as he]

Each and every single night they camp out there, hand-in-hand, while they stare up at the sky, pointing to the star they call ‘Beth’s Star’, which is nestled right up in the night, bright in contrast against the dark. The star is like Beth herself, bright and cheerful- something good- in a world of death and black. That’s why it’s her star because when Maggie and Daryl see it, they see the reflection of the girl they loved- one by blood and the other by heart.

“I think she’s laughing at us,” Maggie whispers. Daryl’s pretty sure she’s lost her goddamn mind until she explains it to him and even then, he can’t help but feel concerned. She’s going crazy, who can blame her? “See?” she continues, finger pointing up at the star to the left. “It’s flickering. She’s laughing.”

He just stares at her, hand fumbling forward through the darkness to thread his fingers with hers, heart sticking in his throat when the brunette turns to look at him, a smile finding its way upon her hollowed face.

“Maybe because we’re such a pathetic dynamic,” she says, the smile not once fading- not even for a second. “Who would’ve thought? Maggie Rhee and Daryl Dixon, hand-in-hand, heart-in-heart.”

He likes the sound of that even though he won’t admit it _. ‘Hand-in-hand, heart-in-heart’_ \- that’s what she said, right? Those are the very words he locks up in his chest, remembers them in the corner of his mind for a day when things seem hopeless because he likes to think that he’s heart-in-heart with Maggie, with the woman who brings an ache to his body when she smiles or laughs because she looks like Beth, a little too much.

When he looks at Maggie, he sees darkness, not the light he saw in Beth, but despite that, he seeks comfort in it. He hides in Maggie’s darkness like a child in a blanket during a thunderstorm, because she is soft and warm and comforting, and he couldn’t ask for more.

“Daryl Greene,” he corrects.

“Oh.”

God.

_Fricking._

Damn.

It.

At first he finds it hard to look at her, to stop feeling the weight of the ghost of that word weighing down on him but he eventually does, eyes flickering softly up to hers, trying to stem the tears that threaten to overflow. He’s never really been much of a crying, he owes his newfound overactive tear ducts to a dead girl named Bethany Greene.

“I guess that makes me a Dixon.”

He wasn’t talking about her but she takes it that way and he doesn’t deny it, doesn’t push her off when she presses her dry lips against the cracked skin of his cheek, feeling the way her breath stops until she pulls away, looking uncertain of her own actions.

This time, when she moves closer, somehow she ends up kissing him, hand still tangled in his, and he doesn’t move, doesn’t back away, just smells her, feels relief wash over him because he’s technically still kissing a Greene, just not the one he first fell in love with.

Daryl opens his eyes, instead seeing blonde instead of brown and it is something that can’t be helped when he pulls away- breaks his lips apart from Maggie’s and falls down to the floor, back hitting the ground with a smack. “I can’t,” he whispers, hoping that she understands, knows that all he sees in the older Greene is the sister he failed, the sister whose face haunts him in Maggie’s because he can’t look at Glenn’s wife- he has to remind himself that she’s a Rhee and what he’s doing is so, so, so wrong- without seeing those swimming blue eyes, the ones he always lost himself in.

There is a grief settled down upon them like a cloak that can’t be removed, can’t be shaken or taken off, it is something that has to be worn.

For a moment she looks hurt until she nods, eyes flickering back up to the camp where Rick, Judith, Carl, Michonne and Carol sit, laughing at something. Glenn died sometime ago, a few days after they discovered Beth’s star and the hurt hasn’t numbed, not yet.

She stills wears the wedding ring, much like Rick, and whenever Daryl holds her hand, his finger runs over it and he opens his mouth like he wants to say something but he doesn’t. She thought he wanted to kiss her; she didn’t think wrong, he’s just not sure.

It’s a few days from now when he kisses her first, eyes squeezed shut like he can’t bear the thought of opening them and seeing her face. It feels wrong, like they’re betraying the two people either of them loved but they are happy and that seems so rare.

Daryl sees Beth in his dreams but she’s never the same, never the hopeful blonde he used to know, just a ghost that yells or screams. That’s what Maggie’s become too, a ghost. She looks too much like the woman he loves to ever love her in her own way. She is Beth, to him, and in a weird way, she loves him because he’s Beth too. They seek Beth in eachother and while that seems wrong- really, really wrong- neither of them really minds.

They deserve the comfort, the love, the warm feeling they get when they lie down together.

The redneck tilts his head, catching the fresh soil on top of the blonde's grave. Rick put more dirt over it some time ago but it still feels like an eternity, or just yesterday. Time isn't something Daryl cares for too much.

He knows that it's been sixteen days since he held a still-warm body in his arms, carried the woman he loved down five whole flights of stairs, trying not to cry because he didn't want to.

When they buried her, he'd bit out a few simple words, something that no one understands but Beth; something that seemed to hold so much more meaning that simple words should.

_'I'm glad I didn't say goodbye.'_

Rick spent a few moments out there, standing by her grave. Most of the time his head was dropped in his hands, silent tears shaking his body. He loved her too, just differently. He didn't love her by heart- like Daryl- or blood- like Maggie-, but because they were friends, family. She was the girl who had too much damn heart and in the end, it got her killed.

They all loved Beth, all of them, and it’s not fair they didn’t get more time.

“Hey, Daryl,” Maggie says, nudging him, hand flying into the air oncemore, pointing her slender finger. “It’s us. See? Those two stars, the ones by the star to the left, right near eachother. They look like twins.”

“Us?”

“Yeah, heart-in-heart, hand-in-hand.”

It’s their star, their little thing that they share. They decide to call it ‘the stargazers’ because though the stars are indeed stars, they’re looking down on Beth’s star, almost... smiling. It’s half sickening and half heart-warming; Daryl’s still choosing between the two.

They lie there, eyes scoring the skies, hands clasping at eachother, lips still warm from the other's.


End file.
